Fancy Four Letter Words
by Virgins-and-Surgeons
Summary: Ulquiorra and Gin have a chat about love.


Another shinigami falls to his blade, while screeching a lover's name. He does not understand this, and honestly, it's getting on his nerves. Ulquiorra has never understood the point of a trivial emotion that can cause nothing but trouble for an otherwise sane human being.

"Hey 'Quiorra," He hears someone chime, and glances over to his superior, now casually spearing a fleeing shinigami and ripping them in half with a flick of his wrist. They hear yet more screams in the distance; the sounds of battle, and the loss of life.

"Sir Ichimaru," Ulquiorra replies smoothly, and when an unsuspecting shinigami rounds a corner of the maze-like white walls and runs right into him, Ulquiorra blows his head off with a cero as the woman cries a name. Another one crying the name of another. Gin whistles at seeing the damage, almost as if he's impressed. They both know that he's never impressed. After a moment of silence, Ulquiorra does something unexpected. He asks a question. "Why do they cry out the names of others? It serves no purpose to save either their lives or the lives of the ones they call for."

Gin hums to himself a moment, stepping over ruined bodies and abandoned zanpakutou as he traces a path towards Ulquiorra, and walks past him casually. "Well, 'Quiorra," He begins with the pet name that he knows Ulquiorra detests, "Guess ya could say that it's love."

Ulquiorra raises an eyebrow, before watching Gin aim up his Shinso with a blank wall. "Love? An idiotic notion."

"Nah, not idiotic, per se," Gin explains, before Shinso shoots out and impales through a wall. There's a cry of agony from the other side, and when Shinso retracts, his blade is stained with blood. "Jus' a little pathetic. _You_ don't see it, a'course, but love's a real funny thing. Makes people do stupid things that get 'em killed. Makes people go insane, sometimes. I seen a lot of love in my time, and none of it goes well."

"None?" Ulquiorra queries, as he follows the lighthearted Gin down another street. Blood runs into the impromptu gutters, and it stains the edges of Ulquiorra's white tailcoat red as they lick the bloody ground now and then. "If they know that it never works out well, then why do they indulge in it?"

Gin sidles up to a burning building and slashes the supports, watching it rain fiery debris down on whoever is under it at the time while it falls. There are screams. Gin thinks he sees that Yamada kid dive out of the way, skittering away with his adorable little healing kit over his shoulder. The kids these days are an optimistic bunch. "Well, let's look a li'l deeper into the concept of 'love'. If ya look at some 'a these human world psychologists, like that Freud fellow," Gin explains, walking through a dip in the road now filled with blood, staining his foot up to the ankle entirely red, "then ya'll know 'bout this innate want of self-destruction we all got in us. I'm thinking that love is jus' a hidden expression of this urge, 'an that's why we're willing to die for someone we say we love. It'd explain why abused wives stay wit' their husbands, why people'll let themselves die 'ta save others, why obsessed stalkers'll kill their object of affection and then themselves." He explains, casually aiming a Kido at a straggling group of shinigami trying to escape his and Ulquiorra's interest. The smell of burning flesh reaches them, sickly sweet.

Ulquiorra walks through the carnage, unable to feel any disgust or empathy for the burning shinigami bodies at his feet. "And so you think this emotion of love is just a destructive impulse set for human beings to eventually terminate themselves over?"

"Nah nah nah," Gin shakes his finger, his back to Ulquiorra, "that's not my place 'ta say. I seen people in love that insist they're happy as can be, and they're prolly right. Love's like…a mental disease. Warps ya thoughts. Some say it's a beautiful thing, love. I can't say it's not. I'm just sayin' that it's an ugly thing 'ta me."

Ulquiorra steps out with Gin into an open area, where blood splatters across the left side of his face. Gin happened to step behind Ulquiorra at the correct time, and he's not hit. Ulquiorra gives a blasé glance at Grimmjow as the Sexta laughs, leaps over a wall, and begins to chase someone else down to mutilate them as well.

"And so you do not believe in love?" Ulquiorra queries, and Gin laughs slightly. It's impossible to know whether he's laughing at Ulquiorra's words or at a body sprawled at his feet, brunette and female and without a throat. Gin takes her Lieutenant's badge as a souvenir, tossing it up and down into his palm while he continues to walk.

"I do. Felt it myself. I was right 'bout it, too. Love's a sickly thing. Like some sorta dyin' animal. Keepin' it around is gonna do nothing for you but give ya hell." He states, standing there and watching a tall white tower in the distance crumble and fall. An earsplitting crash follows it, a noise that rips through the entire area. Ulquiorra and Gin watch it happen, and there's an odd serenity about them as they stand there among the burning remnants of the shinigami forces.

"Hope you're not thinkin' of fallin' in love any time soon." Gin says, cheekily. Ulquiorra closes his eyes and sighs slightly, turning and beginning to walk in the opposite direction through the remnants of Seireitei, towards a distinct reiatsu not too far away. He has something to settle with a woman that thinks she can save his soul with the power of love.

"Of course not." Ulquiorra states, in monotone, as he disappears into the depths of Seireitei once again.


End file.
